The problem to understand and simulate clouds and precipitation is longstanding and unequivocal in its importance for our community. It is also multidimensional: observation, theory and model development must go hand in hand to improve our understanding. The processes involving clouds and precipitation span scales ranging from the microphysical to radiative and thermodynamic effects that are emergent globally. They cannot be subsumed by one single computer simulation but must always be treated in a unified combination of process observation, theory and modelling. The multi-scale nature of the problem also naturally explains why it will not be possible to fully resolve the problem in any reasonable way in the foreseeable future. Instead, we will have to adapt our approaches to the questions that are being posed.

We invited researchers to come to Berlin to join us for an international conference on "Understanding clouds and precipitation through highly resolved process modelling and observations".

We reflected the different dimensions of the problem in four sessions (see also the Outcomes at the right for session summaries by the chairs):